Meet The Team

Tony Jones

Sport Presenter

Nine News sports presenter Tony Jones studied at a radio school before beginning his career in radio newsrooms in country Victoria and Melbourne's 3AW. He joined GTV Channel 9 in May 1986, making the move from news into sport.

Tony began reading weekend sports bulletins in 1988 and moved to weeknight sports presenting in 1990.

With a lifelong passion for sport or as Tony describes, 'an overall interest and knowledge of most sports with an emphasis on football', he did once play football, but admits his footy career was not one of 'great notoriety'.

Tony received enormous critical acclaim for his one-hour special tribute to Victorian football legend, E.J. Whitten. The former Footscray champion was close to death when the special went to air in 1995 and Tony was moved when family members told him Ted Whitten watched the program twice and loved it.

Over the past 30 years Tony has covered all Australia's major sporting events. During 1994, Tony covered the historic tour of South Africa by the Australian Cricket team and received the Victorian Cricket Association's Best Television Story Award for his exclusive story of Dean Jones' retirement from international cricket.

During the tour Tony witnessed history as South Africa was heading towards its first open elections and met future President, Nelson Mandela. Tony took the opportunity to ask him several pertinent questions about the South African team's chances against the Australians.

In 1995, Tony combined his Nine News commitments with a breakfast radio program on Gold 104 with Greg Evans. On Saturdays he presented The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, a one-hour show with Lou Richards and Jason Dunstall. In 1997, this show aired on Fridays without Dunstall.

In 1998 Tony joined former Melbourne coach, Neil Balme and sports journalist Linda Pearce to present a sports show on Gold 104 called The Curtain Raisers.

Tony also hosted Sports Sunday in 1998, a live weekly program renowned for its quality reporting, for breaking major sports stories and winning numerous prestigious awards.

From 2001 to the end of 2003, Tony took on the role of producer on The Sunday Footy Show.

2002 was an especially busy year for Tony. Along with his news commitments, he joined Nine’s Friday Night Football team, produced the Allan Border Medal telecast and continued producing The Sunday Footy Show.

In 2003, Tony hosted Nine’s Sunday afternoon AFL coverage including Nine’s Sunday Football and Nine’s Sunday Football Live. He also made headlines when he was able to retrieve Lauren Burns’ Olympic gold medal in a National Nine News exclusive.

The following year, Tony continued to spread his talents – reporting for Nine’s Today program and presenting on Melbourne sports radio station SEN.

In 2006, he took over as host of The Sunday Footy Show and was a member of Nine’s reporting team for the telecast of the 2006 Melbourne Commonwealth Games.

The same year, Tony joined the breakfast team of Sport 927 as a regular contributor.

Tony had the grim task of reporting live from the scene of the Victorian Black Saturday bushfires in 2009 and broadcasting the news of the death of his lifelong colleague and friend, legendary Channel Nine newsreader, Brian Naylor.

In February of the following year, Tony covered the 2010 Olympic Winter Games from Vancouver for the Nine Network.

2010 also saw Tony take on the role of co-presenter of the Radio Sport National (formerly Sport 927) breakfast program alongside Michael Christian.

On May 5, 2011, Tony Jones celebrated 25 years with the Nine Network.

Throughout 2012, Tony held a weekly spot on the ‘Brig & Lehmo’ breakfast show on radio station Gold 104.

In 2013, Tony enjoys a weekly sports segment on Neil Mitchell’s top-rating morning program on radio 3AW.

Tony and his wife Annette live in Melbourne with their son Mitchell and daughter Lauren.